


Do Overs and Second Chances

by beyondambivalent



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Cat and Kara talk about what's been happening, Cat is back with her inspiring speeches, F/F, Slow Burn Supercat, mentions of the you know which canon ship, post kara getting fired from CatCo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 11:00:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10638489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beyondambivalent/pseuds/beyondambivalent
Summary: “Miss Grant.”Cat gracefully turned on her heel, her shoulders set, and business mask falling back into place, “You idiotic, currently unemployed, entitled millen—”a.k.a Kara got herself fired, Cat finds out. One-shot.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I must've read like 20 stories about this already, but it wouldn't leave my brain (and I barely have internet) so writing happened. I've been re-watching Cat's scenes from season 1, so there are few quotes from there as you will notice.
> 
> Disclaimer: I know nothing about laws or contracts, that part is made up.

“You know something? Maybe being Supergirl, and having you is enough,” Kara found herself saying.

“You think so?” Mon-El smiled.

Kara was about to answer when insistent knocking on the door interrupted. She frowned, not expecting any company for the night, and used her x-ray vision. Kara immediately jerked away from Mon-El and used her super speed to get to the door. She quickly fixed her shirt and glasses, and opened the door.

“Miss Grant!” Kara said, surprise coloring her voice.

Cat strutted into the apartment, brushing past Kara like this was a normal occurrence. She was about to turn around when she noticed the guy in the apartment. “You. Out.” Cat gestured to the door.

“Excuse me,” Mon-El scoffed, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

“I’m sorry, was I using my inside voice? Out, now.”

“Listen Lady, I don’t know who you are but you can’t just come to our place, and kick… me… out,” Mon-El faltered in his words as Cat stalked towards him.

“This alpha male display might work on some less… versed audience, but I’ve known men like you my whole life. Arrogant, self-serving—” Mon-El was about to talk when Cat lifted her finger, “Your opinion and your words, like you, are irrelevant. So pack it all up, and GET OUT.”

Kara who had been standing there in shock about seeing Cat, finally snapped out of it and pulled Mon-El towards the door, knowing Cat would not stop till she got what she wants. “We’ll talk later, Mo—Mike.”

“Wait, where am I supposed to go?”

Kara rolled her eyes, “Don’t you have work?”

Mon-El stopped at the door way, “I took the night off, thought we could spend it together. It’s me and you now, isn’t it?”

He was just echoing her earlier sentiment, but Kara felt a discomfort gnawing at her chest at hearing her words repeated. “I’ll call you later, okay?” Kara smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

Mon-El looked annoyed, and glanced back at Cat who seemed to be ignoring the whole conversation, and inspecting the artwork on the wall, “Who is she anyway?”

“She’s my…” Kara faltered, not knowing how to describe Cat. _Boss, mentor, friend, almost something, everything._ “It’s complicated.” Kara just needed him to go away now.

He finally nodded, pressed his lips to her, and made his way out of the apartment. Kara closed the door, took a deep breath, and turned to face Cat, who was still looking at the painting.

The sight of Cat standing in her apartment, right there, pulled something in Kara’s chest, and she had to stop herself from rushing to hug the woman. She observed Cat for a few seconds, noticing how all the attitude from before seemed to be replaced by something that made her cross her arms across her chest and worry at her bottom lip. Kara tilted her head curiously. Cat seemed to be hesitant, her heartbeat more erratic than when she was chewing Mon-El out.

 

“Miss Grant.”

Cat gracefully turned on her heel, her shoulders set, and business mask falling back into place, “You idiotic, apparently currently unemployed, entitled millen—”

“Wait Miss Grant, I know what you—”

“Oh don’t you Miss Grant me now, not when you act as if you hadn’t been working for me for more than two years, as if I hadn’t taught you anything at all.”

“Miss Grant, I can explain,” Kara attempted to calm down her former boss.

“Explain how you went up against everything—acting like that vindictive banshee when she tried to take a scoop to the Daily Planet after I refused to run the story—”

Anger sparked in Kara at the comparison with Siobhan, “I had no choice, people—aliens were in danger! I had to warn them.”

“There is always a choice! Instead of being a good reporter, cultivating your sources, doing all the grunt work, you chose the easy way. Post it on a website… One with your fucking name on it,” Cat threw her hands up angrily, “It’s like you didn’t even think about what you were doing.”

“I had to get the story out there.”

“Do you think you’re the only one who’s ever been in this situation, that Snapper, all the hags at the Daily Planet you look up to, and I have never been put in the position where we couldn’t publish a story? Even if it was true, even if it could save lives, expose corruption, just because it was half cooked and we couldn’t get credible sources. But there is a right way to do things, to keep journalism honest and objective. I thought I taught you that.”

“You did Miss Grant, but—”

“You know, I have been let down by a lot of people in my life,” Cat looked up at the ceiling, “I never thought you would be one of those people, _Kiera_.”

Kara’s shoulders sagged at Cat’s disappointment, but anger quickly replaced the hurt that was building up, threatening to choke her. “What would you have had me do? Huh? Let people get kidnapped by Cadmus just because of Snapper’s arrogance and refusal to believe Supergirl?”

“Snapper didn’t not believe Supergirl, this was a sensitive issue that could cause public panic. As unfortunate as it was, the lead source couldn’t just be the words of an alien if the public were to believe the threat. Supergirl needed someone to have her back on this, verify the story.”

“The words of an alien? You plastered Supergirl on every newspaper, TV, and website so that world can trust her. Why would this have been any different?”

“Because this was too big. Because I wasn’t here!” Cat bellowed, “The public trusts Supergirl because I trust her. You’ve seen it before, when I denounced Supergirl, the whole city immediately turned on her. When Supergirl showed up to save me from Leslie and Siobhan, and I put her willingness to sacrifice herself for the people out there to see, and Supergirl won the people back. I’m not so arrogant as to say that I control public opinion, but there’s an undeniable connection between what I say and how people view Supergirl. This is part of why I took time off, you needed to be your own hero Kara, to get the chance to earn and maintain the public’s trust without any crutches. So that people can have trust in you, without me, Cadmus, or anyone else being in control of that. But this takes time, I’ve barely been gone a few months.”

“Miss Grant, I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

“Oh for crying out loud, are we still going to play this silly charade? After all this? After you used yourself as a source on every other article you wrote? What were you thinking Kara?”

“YOU WEREN’T HERE, OKAY?” Kara replied bitterly, “you weren’t here, I had no crutches, no one who had my back. You want me to admit I’m Supergirl, fine. You win. I am Supergirl, and I had to make a decision. Snapper wasn’t listening, I tried to do the right thing.”

“Saying you’re Supergirl is redundant at this point, don’t you think? And how does that saying go again? The road to hell is paved with ‘I tried to do the right thing’,” Cat said dryly, “you choose to have 2 separate identities, and yet you can’t keep them separate. This why I didn’t want you to be working at CatCo when I found who you are. You’re taking on too much, too fast, and the lines between Supergirl and Kara start to blur. I set Kara Danvers on the road to be a reporter, now why was she trying to save the world?”

“I am BOTH of them,” Kara ran a hand through her hair in frustration, “I can’t pretend I don’t know what Supergirl knows.”

“The rules are there for a reason. You chose to have 2 separate identities for a reason, and as far as I could tell, you’re moonlighting as Supergirl, but Kara Danvers is who you are. Wasn’t that your whole speech when I confronted you about being Supergirl before? Has that changed in my absence?”

 

Kara stood by her window, looking out at the stars.

“My parents left behind a legacy of death and destruction across the universe, and when it was time to act, they chose wrong. Didn’t even tell anyone that their world was ending, that they were all going to die. Didn’t give anyone else the chance to save Krypton, to save themselves or their own children if they could. To even just say goodbye. And my people were just wiped from the stars. I wasn’t going to let that happen again, as Kara or as Supergirl.”

“Your parents’ legacy is not death and destruction, Kara, it’s you,” Kara didn’t turn to face Cat but she felt how close the woman was, “and your passion, and your integrity to right wrongs and to see justice done. I know you were scared, but in our line of work, we’re not doing a good job, unless we let it get personal. We all learn this the hard way when we’re starting out, and you are no different. Snapper telling you he can’t run the story wasn’t him trying to bury the story, believe me I would know.

“You see Kara, we do what we do, strive to report the whole truth objectively, not just because we want to be good journalists, but also because we want to be good people. On the field, one misinformation and you jeopardize people’s lives. It’s the same thing with reporting. One misattributed quote, one fake source, one unfounded accusation, and you risk turning people’s worlds upside down. We owe it to the people who trust in us to do our best, to give them all the information they need to make a decision, without any speculations, lies, or half-truths.”

“I had to give these people a chance, Cat. No one gave that to my people,” Kara said, her shoulders shaking.

“Oh Kara,” and there it was, Cat’s hands pulling at her shoulder, turning her around, and holding her in an embrace tight enough that she could almost feel it. Whatever walls she had been putting up the last few months broke, and she couldn’t hold back her sobs. “I got you. I’m right here.”

“I d-don’t…” Kara didn’t know what she wanted to say, but Cat seemed to understand that. Kara shuddered at the loss of contact when Cat pulled away from the hug, but Cat held her hand and pulled her to the couch. Kara found herself nestled against Cat’s smaller body, head resting against Cat’s shoulder, hands held between Cat’s.

“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore,” Kara managed to choke out.

Cat’s thumb was softly caressing Kara’s hand, “What’s going on with you, darling?”

“I feel as trapped as I did when I spent 24 years in complete darkness after watching my planet die. It was so awful Cat, I screamed and I cried and I tried to break the pod, anything to get out of there, out of my head. I must’ve hit something right at some point because the pod’s system recognized I was in distress and put me in stasis,” Kara felt more than heard Cat’s sharp intake of breath, Cat’s hands tightening more around hers, tethering her to this moment, “You told me to dive, but maybe I’m just not cut out for this.”

“No one is more cut out for this than you, Kara. You have been through so much, and you’ve taken it all in stride, and came back out on top, time and time again. You have people around you who—” Cat was interrupted by Kara shaking her head.

“Everyone left me all alone. James and Winn barely talk to me, Lucy is apparently on the world’s longest mission, and Lena doesn’t know anything about me. Alex is always busy with her girlfriend. I’m really happy for her, but things have been rough between us since Jeremiah—my foster dad—came back, and I’m not used to doing any of this without her. And you…” Kara listened to Cat’s increasing heartbeat, lets it wash over her after such a long absence, “You were gone, no calls, no emails, nothing. The only one I have is Mon-El, and he wants to be with me.”

“He’s hardly the only one,” Cat mumbled, but Kara heard her. She sat to look at Cat, head tilted in confusion. The thought of what Cat could mean sent tingles up her hands that were still in Cat’s. Then Cat continued, “Does he make you happy?”

“He’s here, he cares about me... In his own way.”

“Does he make you happy?”

“He’s like me, from a sister planet called Daxam. The destruction of my planet turned his into a wasteland.”

That seemed to have caught Cat’s attention a bit, but she barreled through, “Kara that’s not what I’m asking. Does he make you happy?”

Kara finally stopped to think about the question. There was nothing in her saying _yes_ , especially not when it was Cat asking her that question. Kara looked up at Cat, almost pleading. _For Cat to drop the question, for Cat to know the answer, for Cat to just uncomplicated things for her_.

Cat made an unintelligible sound, her face morphing through so many emotions that Kara couldn’t keep up with. “I can’t answer this for you, Kara,” Cat’s voice was soft, in something akin to reminiscence, “You have to figure this one out of yourself. All I can tell you is that you don’t have to settle for anyone who leaves you answering this question with anything but a resounding _yes_.”

Cat was staring at her so intensely, as if begging her to see something that she’s missing, and _by God, Kara knew exactly what she was missing._

 

Cat sighed, “I’m not going to apologize for being tough on you Kara. You know I’ve always pushed you, held you to a higher standard; both as Kara and as Supergirl. I can’t reward you when you mess up. You’ve seen what happened with Leslie. But I do apologize for not talking to you sooner, for not letting you know how proud I was when I saw your first by-line, and when I read your articles about the alien fighting ring, about the kids who were abducted to slavers’ moon, and even about Luthor’s alien detection device; although I do think you were a little bit too lenient with your adjectives in that one.”

Kara chuckled, “Snapper said that my initial draft was ‘over-saturated with my pro-alien slant’.”

“I suppose that’s why I hired him to teach you after all,” Cat scoffed, “You were doing so well for a while that I knew I made the right decision, that I’ve taught you all I can and you no longer needed me th—”

“—I’ll always need you Cat,” Kara interrupted, “You told me that people look to their heroes, not only for rescue, but for solace and consistency. That’s who you are Cat. You give me that hope. You inspire me to be a better person. And that’s not something you can just teach and leave.”

Cat cleared her throat, fighting a smile by biting her lower lip, “Well scientists had better be working on something to preserve my mind; otherwise the world will lose out on my brilliant thoughts.”

Kara laughed, “I guess this would be a good time to tell you about my parents’ A.I.s.”

Cat’s eyes widened, “Are they all knowing machines that spy on people?”

Kara mock gasped, “Cat Grant watching television in her time away from CatCo?”

“Kara Danvers having enough free time to know exactly what I’m talking about?” Cat retorted lightly.

“Zor-El.”

“Huh?”

“Kara Zor-El, that’s my real name,” Kara watched how Cat’s face lit with awe, as if this was more precious than the knowledge that Kara was Supergirl.

 

“Well, what’s next for Kara Zor-El then?” Cat asked, and Kara didn’t think she could ever feel this way from someone, _from Cat_ , just saying her name.

“I’m not sure… I thought maybe just being Supergirl is enough for now,” Kara said, but that discomfort from before came gnawing again.

Cat gave a non-committal nod, “Sure, we can talk in a couple of months when you find yourself staring into an existential abyss that even rescuing snakes out of trees cannot fill.”

“Wh—I do more than _just_ rescue snakes our of trees as Supergirl! And that was just one time!”

“Semantics,” Cat waved her off, “Point is, I was wrong. Yes it happens once or twice, and no that look of glee should definitely not stay on your face. Supergirl is what you can do, it’s not who you are. You are smart and talented and need to work so that you don’t lose your confidence, your self-identity, and your mind.”

“Wh—what can I do?”

“You know I don’t believe in failure, not when you can get up and face the music. Now I can’t give you your job back…”

“I know…”

“But I did stop Legal from suing you for publishing on a competing social media platform. Turns out this domain was purchased on a computer paid for by CatCo, using an email and bank account linked to CatCo regarding work you were doing for CatCo. So that means _technically_ danvers.com is CatCo’s property.”

Kara’s eyes widened, “Wh—?”

“Well I did say technically, right? No one really argues when the CEO who’s notorious for serving lawsuits says this isn’t one. But that little I.T. Hobbit did answer my phone call and sent me some 1s and 0s that show that legally it belongs to me. Something about access to my accounts from when you were my assistant,” Cat waved her hand, too obviously proud of the solution to care about the details, “and so while your contract was terminated, it wasn’t for direct breach of contract, which means…”

“I can work at CatCo again…” Kara completed in half disbelief, half awe at the lengths that Cat went to do this for her.

“Not right now of course, and not for the investigative team at CatCo magazine, but I do own a newspaper, a TV channel, and multiple social media platforms, which now include a blog with only one published article.”

“Cat, I don’t—I don’t know what to say…”

“Say you’ll take some time off. Go play full-time superhero. Fix your relationships with your sister and friends. Work on some of those emotions behind emotions. Show me that you can set some boundaries for your identities. Then get back to being the astonishing CatCo employee and National City hero that I know you are. This is a second chance for you Kara, and you know by now how precious those are, so you’d better not waste it.”

Kara grinned at the prospect, but then her smile fell slightly, “And what about you? What will you be doing?”

“Well it seems to me with CatCo losing its reporter with bleeding heart, pro-alien views that someone should pick up that mantle,” Cat teased, earning a laugh from Kara, “But in my time off I have discovered that the new seas that I had to conquer were right where I left, and that I was actually running away instead of diving.”

Cat’s eyes fell on her lips for just a second or two, before it trailed back up to her eyes, but something burst inside Kara’s chest, something warm that filled her up enough to be able to _wait_ for the right time, that there was hope, after all, in something that she has longed for but didn’t allow herself to act on.

“And we still have a lot to talk about. Like how the hell you found yourself pushing against a one million-ton spaceship for the second time in 6 months...”

Kara couldn’t help the grin that overtook her face as she watched Cat talk. _Yes she can definitely wait; after all, she found the person that leaves her answering the question with a resounding ‘yes’._

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism/suggestions always welcome, I struggle with non-dialogue bits a lot. The downside of starting out writing screenplays I'm told O.O


End file.
